JERUSALEM, Jan. 6 — Two of Israel’s most important relationships in the world are with the United States and Egypt. In the past 10 days, the Israeli government of Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has managed to embarrass both of them.

First, Defense Minister Amir Peretz approved building a new settlement in the occupied West Bank, in the Jordan Valley, far beyond the current separation barrier, and then seemed astonished when the United States called the action a violation of commitments made under the 2003 peace plan, known as the road map.

Then, on Thursday, only hours before Mr. Olmert was to sit down at a summit meeting with the Egyptian president, Hosni Mubarak, the Israeli Army conducted a botched arrest raid in daylight in the center of Ramallah, the capital of the West Bank. In the ensuing mayhem, four Palestinians died, 20 were wounded, the target got away and Mr. Olmert had to sit through a humiliating tongue-lashing on live television from Mr. Mubarak.

Neither incident was of fundamental importance, and neither, it seems, was intended to create the ensuing ruckus. And neither action, Mr. Olmert’s aides insisted, had been approved by the prime minister.

But together, Israeli politicians and analysts suggest, the moves reflect a malfunctioning Israeli government, deeply split over personalities, politics and policies. It has lost the confidence of most Israelis, according to the opinion polls, which makes Israeli leaders even less likely to take bold political steps domestically or internationally.

It is a government weak on security experience, as well, meaning that Mr. Olmert of Kadima and Defense Minister Peretz of Labor are unlikely to challenge the views and actions of the Israeli military. The rivalry between the men — a political competition between party leaders that has veered into mutual contempt — means that they and their staffs barely speak to one another.

This picture does not include the bitter rivalries within the Labor Party, as Mr. Peretz appears fatally weakened, or between Mr. Olmert and his Kadima party colleague, Tzipi Livni, the deputy prime minister and foreign minister, who Mr. Olmert thinks is angling for his job.

“There’s a mess, but it’s part of a more general mess,” said Colette Avital, a senior Labor legislator on the Foreign and Defense Committee. “There’s a breakdown in communications between the prime minister and the minister of defense. It’s enough to look at them together. When they sit down, they don’t say a word.”

On Friday, Mr. Olmert denied a report that he would fire Mr. Peretz, but there is little doubt that he may do so if the Labor Party itself does not convince its current leader to change portfolios.

Adding to the tension is a traditional attitude by the Israeli military that it should be the prime judge of security issues. When Yitzhak Rabin was prime minister in the 1990s, he used to say that Israel would fight terrorism as if there were no peace negotiations and negotiate peace as if there were no terrorism, meaning that decision making for each track was separate. That sometimes led to politically awkward moments comparable to the two recent ones.

“Over the years, the army and intelligence have called the shots, no matter the political impact,” Ms. Avital said. “There’s a decision made in principle in a given scenario, but when and how to do a raid is left to their discretion and they don’t give a hoot about the political timing. No one coordinates with the political level and there’s little civilian control over operational decisions.”

The situation becomes worse, however, when the military has little respect for its political masters, Ms. Avital concedes, suggesting that Mr. Peretz’s time as defense minister is limited.

Shlomo Avineri, a former Israeli official who teaches at Hebrew University, says that the events of the last few weeks are accidental, but inevitable. “This is a government where the prime minister and defense minister don’t really control their own people in the security services and don’t feel strong enough to challenge them,” he said, and are unable to read the military mind the way that former generals like Mr. Rabin and Ariel Sharon could. Both Olmert and Peretz are on the defensive,” Mr. Avineri said. “It’s a bad scene, and it doesn’t make for strong government.”

An error has occurred. Please try again later.

You are already subscribed to this email.

Mark Heller, of the Institute for National Security Studies at Tel Aviv University, said the problem “goes beyond the prime minister and defense minister not respecting one another.” Worse, “neither one is respected by the public after the Lebanon war, especially in security matters,” he said. “So neither of them is prepared to put his judgment up against that of a high-ranking military officer.”

“A House Not in Order” was the headline on a stinging analysis in Haaretz by the political reporter Aluf Benn. Mr. Olmert, he wrote, “is looking more and more like a tragic hero, unable to recover from the disaster that befell him in the form of the second Lebanon war.”

Mr. Olmert and his cabinet decided to go to war in southern Lebanon against Hezbollah in the course of an hour on July 12, after Hezbollah made another raid into Israel and succeeded in capturing two Israeli soldiers. That raid followed the capture of another Israeli soldier during a raid from Gaza carried out by Hamas on June 25.

The government, in office only four months after an election campaign that saw Ariel Sharon collapse into a coma, decided that a strong riposte was necessary to restore Israel’s military deterrence.

But the cabinet was not set up for war. Mr. Olmert, though an experienced politician, had little security experience; his unlikely defense minister, Mr. Peretz, a trade union leader, had even less. And the chief of staff, Lt. Gen. Dan Halutz, was an air force man.

The war was neither quick nor clean, ending in a United Nations mandated cease-fire after 34 days and no clear victory. Mr. Olmert, Mr. Peretz and General Halutz have kept their posts, but their credibility, both individually and as a team, was badly damaged.

Ms. Livni, though relatively silent during the fighting, later made no secret of her belief that the war could have ended much sooner with the same results; Mr. Olmert, prideful and prickly, has not appreciated her effort to emphasize her disagreements. Only last week, Ms. Livni announced that she was prepared to become prime minister and would run for the job if Mr. Olmert continued to ignore her opinions.

Miri Eisin, a spokeswoman for Mr. Olmert, said she had never seen “Olmert so angry” as he was about the Thursday raid while he was about to meet Mr. Mubarak. The military “had the authority to carry out a raid, but this goes beyond authority to common sense,” she said. “No one in the army was thinking about the timing and relevance.”

After the fuss over the new settlement, Maskiot, Mr. Peretz insisted that his predecessor had really approved it, and then the government argued that it had been set up as a settlement in the early 1980s, even though it had fallen into disuse and was only being used for training.

“These are lame excuses, and anyone can see through them,” Mr. Heller said. “Notwithstanding the rhetoric, it’s clear that the government doesn’t have the political courage to enter into a confrontation with settlers.”

Such incidents won’t bring down the government, Mr. Heller said. “But they are more straws piling on its back, continually undermining confidence in its capacity to function as a responsible government.”

A version of this article appears in print on , on Page A10 of the New York edition with the headline: In a Divided Israel, Angry Words or No Words at All. Order Reprints|Today's Paper|Subscribe